Thursday, August 13, 2015

Basic logic and The Book of Mormon share an interesting concept. Overall, we all claim that we want to go to heaven and live with God for all eternity. I certainly hope that is generally true. However, we find some intriguing questions in LDS scripture such as, in paraphrase, do you actually think you would be comfortable living with God, being in His presence, with a full consciousness of your continual rebellion against His laws? It states that we would be more miserable in those conditions to live with God than to dwell with the damned souls in hell.

I have a most beloved relative who found herself involved in morally dire straits many years ago. She was excommunicated from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, divorced her husband, and lived in horrible circumstances for over two decades. She eventually came to herself and found the strength to return to church and plead with the Church leaders to allow her to be baptized again. It was an arduous process, and I know she wept bitterly alone in her room many times before she finally received approval to come back into the fold. She has since found herself embraced in full fellowship with her brethren and sisters of the Church.

During her religious exile as it were, I heard many people talk of her as though there was no hope for her, no redemption possible, and no point in even trying to help her. I wonder, if we were brought to the judgement bar today, who would have a better chance for exaltation in God's kingdom; the woman who found herself honestly excommunicated or those who held full religious membership and attended meetings externally but inwardly behaved as dark and loathsome hypocrites. I wonder how those will find themselves who make it a point to attend to the visible duties of religious worship but come home and engage in hatred and severity toward those in their home. It isn't for me or for you to judge anyone, but perhaps it may prove something we might question in ourselves. True it is that my relative lost a marriage that can never return to her, but in so doing she gained her own salvation when she had almost irretrievably lost it. What does it profit a man or woman to gain the whole world and lose their soul?

Monday, August 10, 2015

Take a few slow, deep breaths. Feel the air fill your lungs and release all the tension and negativity of the day as you exhale through your nose. Recognize the miracle that is your own person. Continue breathing deeply and calmly as we continue our discussion. You can get tea or cocoa to bring yourself comfort and tranquility, just if you want to. This time is for you to commune with yourself and appreciate yourself. I would invite you to read slowly, stopping when you need to, and really receive these guiding words into your heart. Leave all other thoughts outside of the room in which you find yourself. The outside world will be there when you get there.

Slow down and take the time to be grateful for each gentle heartbeat. Be aware of the beauty that is you and the supernal gift that is your body from the crown of your head to the soles of your feet. You are a glorious being. Take a moment and be aware of the miracle that is your mind and express gratitude for all the warnings, safeguards, and self healing that your mind and body give you without your even asking it to. Give yourself permission to take as much time as you need to be grateful for each aspect of your person. You are beautiful just as you are, and wherever you are on your journey give yourself permission to accept who you are right now. With this mindset we are preparing to begin our journey deeper into who we are.

Feel the masculine or feminine energy of your spirit. Breathe into this energy and let it expand. Let the energy of your gender surround your physical body and express gratitude for the person God has made you. Embrace that energy and look at those thoughts and emotions that rise to the surface of your conscience mind. Don't be afraid to look at your own mentality honestly.

As you keep breathing deeply and slowly, recognize and be aware of the divine creative power that resides in your body. Within you exists the potential to create even human life - the greatest form of creativity of all. Allow that creative energy to fill your body with its influence, rise to your skin and waft from every pore of your body. Rest your hands, palms to the sky, on your knees. Feel the energy of your creativity and individuality in the center of each palm. You are a glorious being.

Recognize that you were always meant for a beautiful journey and that your spirit is capable of eternal progression. It doesn't matter so much where you find yourself in life right now as much as the idea that you are heading toward personal improvement. Hold to this power inside of you and remember that wherever you are and no matter what is happening around you, you can always come back to this peace. You carry it with you. Take a moment to respect who you are as a man or as a woman. Promise yourself that you will never cheapen your masculinity or femininity with anything that will compromise the peace you feel right now. You don't need to search out many partners. You have the strength and the patience within you to wait for the right one, at the right time, in the right way.

I am clearly not a man but I am told that they enjoy feeling like their woman's hero. Being female, it is natural enough to understand that a lady appreciates a man she can admire. We might define heroism in many different ways, and generally when we consider the term "hero" we think of a big, strong superman in cape, boots, and starring in their own Marvel comic strip.

This world is in desperate need of heroes, and heroes of a certain type. We find in our society the role of fatherhood belittled, the dignity of man disregarded, women seeking to stand in roles most suitable to masculinity, and brethren encouraged toward laziness, entitlement and casual sex. We need men who are passionate about being loving father figures, passionate about raising children to be upstanding and teaching them by example, passionate about being masculine, and passionate about doing the morally right thing. These are our greatest present day heroes.

Through a lady's eyes, a hero is the man who is courageous enough to do the right thing in the face of temptation. A hero is the boyfriend who could sleep with his willing and vulnerable girlfriend but exerts his inner strength, chooses to wait until the wedding night, and proposes to her instead. A hero is the man who sees an opportunity for advancement through dishonesty or injuring someone else and has strength enough to give up said window for progression in favor of being a morally upstanding person. My idea of a masculine superman is one who sees the world go its merry, morally degrading way and instead of following the crowd stands tall and strives to make a difference. My idea of a superman is the person who fights his own weaknesses even though he could give into them without anyone knowing or facing immediate consequences. My idea of fearless strength is a man who will walk away, look away and completely retract when faced with a cheap and easy sexual temptation. And let me share a little secret with you, brethren. There is nothing sexier, nothing that leaves a woman more helpless in awed breathlessness, and nothing more likely to get an amazing woman to melt recklessly, thoroughly, willingly, and uncontrollably into masculine arms than a superhero.

This world seems to become morally blacker by the second. I look around me and see person after person fall into spiritual devastation and agonizing vice. I hear the sadness, feel the fear of consequences, and see the crumbling of marriages and homes. It sometimes might feel to many women that men were simply designed to commit adultery and that any woman who thought otherwise was simply dreaming. I have had people tell me this many times in various ways.

In such a temporal world, where temptations run high and sex is cheap I find most strange a phenomenon that also rises in popularity as we speak and which for the life of me I simply cannot understand. I have often heard both husbands and wives recount joys and glories of watching X rated movies together in order to get in the mood for their own bedroom affairs. This practice absolutely boggles my mind. "I encourage him to watch beautiful naked women have sex right in front of me and then am devastatingly shocked that he goes out and has an affair with a younger woman. What an evil, untrustworthy man he is! I would never have guessed!" I'm sorry, but does that make any sense to anyone out there? The fact is that if you are encouraging and even participating in such an act, you are voluntarily opening the door to your significant other cheating on you! Men and women in those videos (as far as I know as I have never watched one) are, by nature or surgery, meant to look beautiful, enticing, and exciting. Compare that to stark reality in a man or woman who is getting higher in years and who does not look perfectly airbrushed. Logically, I do not see how a person can act in that kind of manner and then be surprised when their significant other cheats. I do not quite gather how they would have the right to prove angry, since they also were watching naked people of the opposite gender with a wink and a smile.

The fact is, my friends, that if we want something to last forever, we need to treat it as though it is special and precious. We need to be fiercely loyal to each other and recognize that home is where it is. And if one evening neither person is in the mood? I have a bombshell shock of an idea. How about if the couple have a quiet dinner, turn off their iphones and talk to each other? Strengthen your relationship in different ways. "Bliss" as one male friend of mine described it, "is only one way of showing love." Love can be expressed in many ways and a healthy relationship needs more than physical expression. It requires verbal expression, innocent, uplifting togetherness, and a blending not only of body but of mind, heart and spirit. Work out together. Sing together. Read together. Enjoy your children together. Or hit the theater, snuggle up close and remember why you fell in love in the first place.

Waiting for my children to emerge from their classrooms the first week of school I spied a young boy exit the gates and look around for his parents, who undoubtedly came to gather him home. His shirt read, "I have a million excuses. Which one would you like to hear?" I say nothing of this lad and place the burden of none of my remaining thoughts on the subject on his young and wholly innocent shoulders. But immediately my mind reeled toward the as yet unknown parents, not in judgement but in wishing I could help them comprehend something regarding it. As the child still found himself in elementary school, the adults around him had undoubtedly purchased the shirt and allowed him to wear it. I recognize that in some manners it might seem a harmlessly amusing idea, but think of this-

What mentality do we create for our children in encouraging messages of that nature? What are we teaching our children to expect of themselves? How are we teaching them to live their lives and what kind of citizens are we helping create in them? How will that kind of mentality affect them later in life and in attaining and keeping a job? How will it affect them now in school? Are we setting them up for success or devastating failure and a distorted sense of lackadaisical entitlement? The mind is a powerful instrument and it learns attitudes from seemingly small means around us.

During the baby shower for my daughter, I received a rather humorous present. It was a pink outfit with the words "Does this diaper make my butt look big?" I laughed along with everyone else as it was clever and amusing, but never once did I put it on my infant. One may argue that there would be no harm since she clearly couldn't read, but the attitude that accompanied the acceptance of such an idea was not one I wanted my darling little girl learning. I wanted to teach her from the beginning that her body was sacred and beautiful, and that she would do best to glory in who she was rather than worry about who she was not or about fitting a specified mold. Call me a neurotic mother but if I welcomed such ideas into my daughter's life at so early an age I could hardly be surprised if she ended up with an eating disorder later. Besides, aren't there far better messages I could send her?

I do not intend to shame, insult or injure any parent. I am grateful that the parents of said nameless kid from school clearly supplied him with clean clothes and appropriate shoes. I would merely point out that those subtle things in parenting can catch up with our kids later, that they have more of an effect on their growing minds than we sometimes believe, and that children are precious gifts of God, fully deserving our most passionate devotion and meticulous mental and spiritual care.